tried to stay cautiously optimistic about Metal Gear Solid Delta, but Konami has somehow done it.
I’m still in a dream.
If you’re a Metal Gear fan, chances are your stance on Metal Gear Delta so far has been cautious optimism at best. Konami hasn’t done much with the series since the departure of its creator, Hideo Kojima, but the recent release of MGS: The Master Collection Vol. 1 and the remake of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater shows the Japanese publisher starting to reclaim its most iconic and standout series.
At today’s Xbox Games Showcase, Konami presented the first gameplay trailer of MGS Delta, though it should be noted that while this is all in-game footage, a significant portion consisted of cutscenes. Konami’s approach with Delta focuses on staying true to the original game while providing a stunning visual overhaul and aligning the controls and some mechanics with contemporary expectations. And I probably wouldn’t have called it “stunning” before this trailer.
The look of Delta blows me away because, honestly, I didn’t know if Konami still had it in them. But the jungle environments here are visually some of the best I’ve ever seen, regardless of the map layout supporting them, with the air so humid at points you can almost feel it on your skin. At one point, you see Snake wading through swampwater with the crocodile cap on, before a drone’s searchlights sweep over the surface, the sun blazing over distant hills as the surface ripples, capturing what Snake Eater always looked like in my imagination.
Other observations: the CQC system seems to be pretty in line with what we saw in MGSV: The Phantom Pain, which is great. The animations have been overhauled with real sensitivity to their accuracy and speed. At one point, Snake crawls backward and aims, which is new. Every gameplay sequence shown is present in the original game. The environment layouts seem entirely unchanged. And it ends without giving us a release date.
The only repeated criticisms I’ve seen of the trailer so far relate to the character models of Snake and the Boss, which is always going to be one of those super-subjective calls. For my money, they look fantastic and manage the not-inconsiderable task of recreating a PS2 model’s characteristics while balancing the huge increase in visual fidelity. I’d go against the tide on the Boss especially, who here looks stern, maybe a little weary, and noticeably older than Snake.
This element of Delta in particular was always going to be a challenging task, but I think Konami’s done as good a job as it could have. Note also that in the cutscenes the lip-syncing animations have been vastly improved over the original, though still retain some awkwardness in parts.
I tried to stay cautiously optimistic about Delta, but Konami has somehow got me hyped. Not that my expectations are too wild: MGS3 was a PS2 game and, with how closely Delta is hewing to the source material, this is definitely going to feel outdated in some ways. But it’s also one of my favorite games ever, with an incredible visual update and a few modern quality-of-life improvements. For me, this is a must-buy. But whether Delta’s unique mix of old and new will appeal to the mainstream audience remains to be seen.
By Andrej Kovacevic
Updated on 10th June 2024